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Congratulations to my Stanford classmate, coauthor and friend, Bengt Holmstrom, who has been elected second vice-president of the Econometric Society (winning against me!). Bengt will become president of the Society in 2011. The election is a high honor in recognition of a career of high accomplishment as an economics researcher, teacher and administrator.

Bengt and I began our careers together as assistant professors at Northwestern University, from where we both move to Yale University to continue our collaboration/competition. At Stanford, we shared a dissertation adviser, Robert Wilson. Working with another Wilson student, Alvin Roth, we edited a volume of research celebrating Wilson’s accomplishments.

Congratulations to my PhD advisee, Lixin Ye, who was awarded tenure at Ohio State University. Lixin has produced voluminous research on auctions and industrial organization, including both theoretical and experimental analysis. Congratulations Lixin!

Another round of congratulations for my Stanford undergraduate mentee, Sahand Rabbani. I wrote an earlier post about Sahand’s 2008 Wallace Sterling prize, awarded for ranking in the top 1% of graduating seniors in the School of Humanities and Sciences and his 2008 Terman Prize from the School of Engineering. To top those off, he has now won the 2008 Henry Ford II Scholar award from the School of Engineering, ranking #1 in his class of about 400 engineering graduates.

Did I mention that Sahand also writes short stories and translates Persian poetry? It’s true! Congratulations Sahand: I celebrate your excellence and achievement with you. And your fine character as well!

Josh, who graduated from the University of Chicago in June, received the Leonard B Meyers Prize for the best Bachelor’s Thesis in the Department of Music at the University of Chicago. His thesis, entitled “Okonkolo: The Short/Long Theory of West African Rhythm,” argues that standard Western notation, with its binary basis, cannot adequately notate the rhythms of West African music, but that an alternative short/long notation can do the job.

Elana earned her Master of Arts in June from the University of Texas at Austin. Her thesis, “The Czech Holocaust Novel, Barbarism, Hope and Death: A Comparative Reading of Pan Theodor Mundstock and Život s Hvězdou,” explores the relationship of the Czech Holocaust novel to Holocaust literature in general and the comparative reading of the novels Život s Hvězdou by Jiří Weil and Pan Theodor Mundstock by Ladislav Fuks. The two novels focus on the beginning stages of WWII in the occupation of Prague by the Nazis, and the individualized experiences of the Jewish protagonists. It is because these novels focus on the pre-war period that they can give remarkable and effective portrayals of the Holocaust and the experiences of its victims.

Northwestern University announced today that Paul Milgrom has been awarded the 2007-08 Erwin Plein Nemmers Prize in economics “for contributions dramatically expanding the understanding of the role of information and incentives in a variety of settings, including auctions, the theory of the firm, and oligopolistic markets.” The award, which is made biennially, includes a cash prize of $150,000. The Nemmers Prize Seminar and Conference will be held on November 5-6, 2009.